New club strives to build habitat for monarchs

According to junior Nadia Patel, the monarch population has decreased 80 percent over the years in Cedar Falls, and she has created a new monarch club to help bring the population back. Patel worked with Cedar Falls over the summer of 2023 building Bio Cells by planting monarch friendly gardens in multiple parks around Cedar Falls. From that experience, she decided to create an all original club called the monarch club.

Monarch club meets every other week on Tuesdays in science teacher Jason Lang’s room as of right now, though that may change. Patel said, “I know how busy people are, and I respect their time, and I don’t want to just meet to meet, rather meet with a purpose.” 

She said she hopes to expand the monarch habitat with bio cells. “Bio cells contain many different prairie plants, and they are meant to support many different pollinator populations within Iowa and Cedar Falls,” Patel said. 

According to her, bio cells take time to create. There is a lot of research that goes into it, from figuring out what plants the populations like to planting them in places where the monarchs would go to grow. 

Patel is also creating a website for the club, which will be released on Monday, Oct. 23. 

She encourages those who want to join the club to go to a meeting. Patel releases info on how to get involved on Schoology, but she said anyone is welcome to just go up and talk to her too.